[Mkguild] The Last Tale of Yajakali - Chapter LXXII

[C. Matthias]

And finally, the climax.

Metamor Keep: The Last Tale of Yajakali
By Charles Matthias

Chapter LXXII

Yajakali

         The dawn sun warmed Sir Czestadt’s 
unshaven face as he knelt before the altar in one 
of the side chapels in the basilica in 
Stuthgansk.  The light glinted through stained 
windows and cascaded a rainbow of hues across the 
church’s interior.  An icon of Holy Mother Yanlin 
reposed between flickering candles above the 
golden tabernacle on the altar.  Sir Czestadt’s 
eyes occasionally rose to meet the gaze of her 
soft eyes beneath a blue cowl, but each time he’d 
quickly look away.  Her gaze was kind and gentle, 
and normally his heart warmed at the sight of 
her, but never since the Driheli had returned 
last week from their ill-fated sojourn in Galendor.
         How could he look into her eyes when he 
didn’t know what to do with his own?  The one 
surety he’d always felt, the complete obedience 
to the Bishops who possessed knowledge of the 
will of Eli, had been stripped from him.  How 
could he lead if he couldn’t follow?
         After the Driheli knights had returned 
last week they’d spent one knight together in 
their barracks in Stuthgansk before Czestadt sent 
each to their homes and some, like Sir Guthven 
who he’d promoted to Knight Commander of 
Bydbrüszin, to their new assignments.  His squire 
Hevsky had long noticed his soul sickness and now 
readied suitable attire for appearing in the 
basilica each morning.  All Czestadt wanted to do 
anymore was pray and hope that there would be guidance.
         His eyes trailed up to Yanlin’s simple 
beauty and lowered again, studying the gold 
thread dangling off the altar’s surface.   He’d 
bene praying his beads, but his lips had long 
stopped moving.  With a heavy sigh, the knight 
said, “How can I obey if I have lost my trust?”
         The icon could not reply, but he 
listened anyway, hoping that there would be words 
murmuring in his heart.  Yet always he heard only 
his own thoughts repeated back to him.  In the 
many long days since they had set sail from 
Yesulam, he’d had time alone with his 
thoughts.  He pondered when this unease had 
settled over him.  While chasing Kashin through 
the Steppe, and even after being cut by that 
invisible blade, he’d lost none of his certainty 
and purpose.  The answer had finally come to him 
a few days before.  As soon as he’d seen Bishop 
Jothay’s golden blade the doubts and their agony had entered him like a plague.
         He scowled as he recalled its 
presence.  It had looked like a sword, swung like 
a sword, and sung like a sword.  But it was not a 
sword.  The powers of the Blademaster that he’d 
learned while still a Kankoran had reached out to 
touch and learn that blade’s unique signature, 
but there was nothing for him to learn.  A vast 
emptiness existed where the blade ought to be, an 
emptiness that for all its enigmas had possessed 
a tangible malice that he could still feel 
lingering like an ache from a bone that hadn’t been properly set.
         Sir Czestadt took another long breath, 
trying to drive the image of that blade from his 
thoughts but it grew instead.  He lifted his eyes 
first to the yew emblazoned on the tabernacle, 
and then to the icon of the Holy Mother 
Yanlin.  But those images receded from view as he 
felt the blade’s awareness grow ever closer.
         Something muttered at the edge of his 
consciousness.  They were words, but they were 
not words he knew.  Behind him the light of dawn 
faded to a burnt bronze glow.  Czestadt felt his 
body tense and his limbs tighten.  The sword, 
that golden sword, was awake again.  Just at the 
edge of his vision it mocked him with its diseased life.
         “No,” Czestadt murmured, all alone in 
the side chapel, everything around him so 
impossibly distant. “What are you doing?”
         The sword’s murmuring shifted as if it 
amused it to answer his question.  The voice 
slithered through his mind until the words 
coalesced like ships rowing in through the 
fog.  I am of Yajakali.  The Sunderer of worlds has struck time widdershins!
         Sir Czestadt tried to scream, but found 
everything arrested in that one moment.  The 
light outside spun like a child’s toy.  He 
couldn’t move, couldn’t speak, couldn’t even turn 
his head to look at the golden sword that hovered 
at the edge of his vision.  But he knew that it 
was turning the world inside out, its long-held plans finally come to fruition.
         He tried to find the icon, the one his 
eyes had long avoided, but even that was denied 
to him.  The Knight Templar of the Driheli felt 
the crush of despair overflow his heart.  He did 
the only thing he could do.  He wept.

----------

         It was two days until he wed Dame 
Alberta Bryonoth.  Duke Thomas Hassan of Metamor, 
after enjoying the subdued revelry of the 
Solstice festivities, found that they had done 
nothing to distract him from that reality.  In 
two days time he would be a husband.  How could 
he get any sleep with that preying on his mind?
         The midnight hour was upon them, and 
Duke Thomas stirred restlessly from his chambers 
to find somebody he could talk to.  He’d already 
spent most of the last week discussing details 
with Thalberg and Malisa.  While Andwyn would 
certainly be awake at this late hour, the bat was 
never amiable company even in the best of 
times.  All of his vassals had arrived and were 
staying at the Keep, but he’d already had enough 
advice from Lords Avery, Barnhardt, Christopher 
and the rest.  In truth, he wasn’t sure who he 
wished to speak with.  Not a single soul sprang to mind.
         So it came as a bit of a surprise to see 
a boy of about fourteen who was really a man of 
forty strolling down the hall toward him.  The 
boy was also surprised, but the shock gave way to 
a pleased smile.  The four guards trailing at 
Thomas’s back relaxed when he knelt. “Good 
evening, your grace.  Are you having trouble sleeping too?”
         “Master Lidaman,” Thomas said with a 
bemused grin. “How can I sleep with the weight of a kingdom on my shoulders?”
         The man mostly responsible for keeping 
Metamor financially afloat in those first few 
years after the Battle of Three Gates laughed 
with the austerity of a man past his prime. “The 
weight of a wedding is more likely I think.”
         “You have the right of it there.”
         Lidaman smiled affectionately.  Thomas 
had never been close to the moneylender as he 
eschewed living in the Keep.  He and his family 
had been spared from the assault last Winter 
Solstice as they’d been in the Lothanasi temple 
when the attack came.  But he was no stranger to 
sorrow, having lost his brother’s family during 
Three Gates.  And he had been friendly with 
Thomas’s father while the horse had been just a 
boy.  Odd how the curses had reversed their 
respective ages.  Now it was Thomas who seemed 
the adult to the childish Lidaman.
         The horse lord smiled as he regarded the 
simply dressed moneylender. “The kitchens 
shouldn’t be far.  Care to join me there for a 
drink or two?  I’m sure we can scare up something to chase away the hours.”
         “That would be most agreeable, your 
grace.  In fact, I just passed the kitchen coming this way.”
         Together they went back the way Lidaman 
had come and found the Keep’s Kitchens off the 
passage.  The wide room smelled of bread, fish, 
fruit, and a variety of vegetables and 
meats.  Underneath it all was the familiar dry 
musk of his crocodilian steward and the various 
scents of his staff.  None of them were about, 
and so while two guards stood position outside 
and the other two took to lighting lamps, Thomas 
and Lidaman scoured the counters and cupboards for something to drink.
         “Aha,” Thomas declared as he opened a 
door and a wine rack within.  He bent to study 
the labels. “So what brought you to Metamor tonight, Master Lidaman?”
         “My soon to be son-in-law,” Lidaman 
replied. “He had some ideas he wanted to share 
with me that might improve our business.”
         “Will they work?” Thomas wrapped his 
hoof-like fingers around the neck of a bottle 
containing a particularly tempting vintage and 
drew it forth.  The bottle swung from his fingers 
until he set it on one of the preparation 
tables.  Covered in lacquered wood, they 
nevertheless showed dent from knife and 
claw.  Stools lined either side and Lidaman 
climbed into one carrying a pair of glasses.
         While Thomas and two of his guards 
scoured for a corkscrew, Lidaman took the time to 
read the wine bottle. Absently, he replied, “They 
might.  I’ll be giving them some serious 
consideration.  And what of your coffers?  Has 
the sale of the mithril you captured helped 
offset the costs of rebuilding the Keep?”
         Thomas nickered as he rifled through 
drawers. “Some.  I may issue a new levy next year 
to recover our losses, but it wouldn’t last 
long.”  While true, it was not the whole 
story.  The mithril had not been captured from 
Nasoj but found at a mine in the Valley by the 
now dead Long Scout Llyn ‘Joy’ Wanderer.  While 
construction at the mine continued quietly, it 
would be a few more years before they could 
refine any significant amount of mithril.  Until 
then, the mine remained a secret known to as few 
as possible.  The moneylender, though an old 
friend of the Hassan family, was not one of those who knew the truth.
         Lidaman frowned. “The merchants won’t like that.”
         “Nor will the Keepers,” Thomas admitted 
as he shoved another drawer shut.
         “Here it is, your grace,” one of his 
guards, a young one only recently become a woman, 
said as she held out a corkscrew.
         “Thank you,” Thomas said, smiled, and 
returned with it to the preparation 
table.  Lidaman waited patiently. “It won’t be 
much and it won’t be long.  But with threats 
building to the South, we’ll need every copper 
penny we can get.”  Thomas popped the cork and 
poured the wine. “I’d rather not rely on the help of creditors unless I must.”
         “I understand,” the boy replied with a 
twitch in his lips. “Nor do I blame you.  Most in 
my profession are seen as greedy sharks who will 
tear their homes away and send them to debtor’s 
prison if they do not pay exorbitant interest.”
         “Nor do I think you that, not after all 
you did for my father and for me.”
         Lidaman sipped his wine. “Very 
true.  Enough talk of money.  I’ve attended too 
many weddings to not know what you are going 
through.  Three of my boys and soon my daughter 
all went through the same thing.  Your life is 
going to change forever in a couple days and the 
prospect is both frightening and wonderful.  And 
you can’t tell which at any moment.”
         Thomas laughed and set his large lips to 
the goblet.  He downed the entire cup in one long 
swallow. “You speak true.  Tell me, you were 
there when my parents wed.  What was it like?”
         “I was only a boy at the time,” Lidaman 
admitted. “More so than I am now certainly, but 
yes, I do remember it.  A grand celebration.  I 
remember my father set me in his lap so...” his 
voice trailed off as he stared at something 
beyond the Duke.  His flesh whitened.
         Thomas turned in his seat as did his 
guards.  Next to the stoves knelt trembling a 
woman he had seen before.  Her face was rich in 
grace and power, long silvery hair encircling her 
body like a den of adders huddling together for 
warmth.  Light glistened across her pale flesh 
and gossamer evening dress.  Her eyes, deep pools 
that spoke of ages not years, wept silvery tears.
         The majesty of this being could only be 
reckoned surpassed by the gods.  And yet, in all 
history that he had ever read of the Keep, never 
once had it spoke of Kyia crying and shivering in fright.
         “Kyia!” Thomas gasped, stumbling from 
his seat onto his hooves.  They clattered noisily 
across the masonry as he tried to reach out for 
the ancient spirit of the castle.  The guards 
held their spears tightly, eyes wide and mouth’s 
agape.  Master Lidaman stared for a moment before 
clumsily following the horse lord.
         Kyia looked up at him, her eyes full of abject sorrow. “Thomas.”
         “What’s happened to you?” Thomas asked, 
bending close and holding out his hands but afraid to touch her.
         “The Censer is...” Kyia said, her body 
wracked by a spasm of alien pain. “Taking everything.”
         Thomas shuddered and swallowed heavily, 
the taste of wine on his tongue turned to 
bitterest ash.  He turned to one of the guards 
and shouted, “Fetch the Lothanasa!  Now!”
         The new woman nodded and ran for the 
doorway to the kitchen.  Kyia extended one arm 
towards her and cried, “No!  You can’t!”  But the 
woman kept running, and then as soon as she tried 
to pass through the door, bounced off the air and 
fell back into the room.  She shook her head, 
dazed.  The other guard, a young warthog, rushed 
to her side to help her to her feet.
         Kyia shook her head. “There is no time.”
         “No time?” Lidaman asked, looking from 
the spirit of the Keep to the guards and to the 
strange doorway.  The hallway outside looked just 
the same as it had a moment ago.
         “The Censer has taken it all,” Kyia 
replied as she shuddered anew. “There is no time 
outside this room.  I cannot keep the time here 
for very much longer.  It is... too strong.”
         The air in the doorway, Thomas noted, 
appeared increasingly still.  And so too did the 
air inside the door.  The motes of dust, glinting 
in the lamplight, hung in the air, shining with a 
constant and unwavering light.  Was that what a 
world without time looked like?  Frozen more securely than a block of ice?
         “Andhun!  Gaspar!” He shouted the names 
of the guards who stood watch outside.  But they did not respond.
         His throat tightening, Thomas lowered 
his hands to and resting them against the 
spirit’s back which surprised him with its 
substantiality.  His heart ached with a fear he 
couldn’t even comprehend.  How could time itself 
be disappearing?  What could that evil Censer 
want with time?  His thick lips found enough 
words for one last question. “What can we do?”
         Kyia’s voice was empty and lost. 
“Nothing.  It is... it is up to those we sent.”
         “They will succeed,” Thomas assured 
her.  He shared a quick glance with Lidaman who 
also came and put his hands on the spirit’s 
back.  The two guards followed suit, each doing 
what little they could to assuage Kyia’s fear and 
pain.  Her celestial flesh trembled with agony. “They must.”
         And quietly, he prayed for his bride 
Alberta, his adoptive daughter Malisa, Kyia 
herself, Andhun and Gaspar just outside, and all 
the others in the Keep.  And he prayed for 
Charles, Jessica, James, Kayla, Lindsey, and 
Habakkuk.  They had to succeed.  The wall of 
motionless dust closed in around them.

----------

         Elizabeth, struggling in her dreams with 
a dreadful presentiment, strolled through the 
World Bell gardens in those bleak hours beyond 
midnight before the new day began.  The gardens 
were warmed with both magic and braziers burning 
a sombre orange around the octagonal 
fountain.  The waters burbled merrily, cascading 
over sheets of marble amidst beds of bright flowers.
         In the centre of the fountain hung the 
World Bell.  Bright gleaming brass fashioned into 
a long cone without any means to ring it hung 
from a marble arch directly over the spot where 
the pathways of magical energy crossing through 
Marigund came closest to intersecting.  Usually 
silent, it rang only in the presence of great magic.
         Elizabeth’s eyes were drawn to that 
bell.  It had rung far too many times in this 
last year.  The entire guild was in an uproar 
over its frequent ululations.  Twice now the 
Pillars of Ahdyojiak had been summoned; once in 
Ellcaran and the second time in Breckaris.  She’d 
learned from Misha that the Censer of Yajakali 
had been fixed into Metamor’s belfry on the 
Summer Solstice, and a similar ring had occurred 
at the Autumnal Equinox; the guild suspected that 
the Sword of Yajakali had been fixed in Yesulam.
         The exact astronomical moment of the 
Winter Solstice would be upon them in 
moments.  Elizabeth wasn’t the only one who had 
come to the gardens dreading what might 
happen.  Demarest, the head of their order, paced 
back and forth scowling at the bell.  Elizabeth’s 
eyes met his own for a moment, but he was too 
distracted to do more than nod to her and then 
resume wearing a ditch into the stone.  None of 
the other wizards spared her a glance.  It had 
been her brother who had brought her into the 
circle that had revealed the workings of evil 
that had struck the World Bell so many times this 
year.  Though irrational, they could not help but 
to some extent blame her for the bell’s discommoding behaviour.
         Elizabeth sighed and rested one hand 
against a marble pillar.  The garden ceiling 
disappeared overhead into a dark series of arches 
and vaults that wended upward, giving the chamber 
the heavenly space of an Ecclesiast 
Cathedral.  The last time she’d spoken with her 
brother the fox, he’d told her that Jessica, her 
one time pupil, had been seen in Breckaris near 
Daedra’kema.  It had been she who had killed the 
Runecaster who had summoned the Pillars; one 
mystery solved.  But they’d learned nothing 
concrete about what had happened in Yesulam.  The 
guild was now contemplating something 
unthinkable; requesting an official envoy from Yesulam to enlighten them.
         She rather looked forward to that 
fight.  It would be the first time in over a 
hundred years that an official from Yesulam would 
be allowed in Marigund other than the paltry 
parish priests that they suffered for the sake of 
peace.  That is if the noble houses didn’t 
squabble the idea to death like they often 
did.  Even her brother Brian, the head of the 
Brightleaf house, was struggling with the notion.
         The air in the chamber, though isolated 
from the outside, always had a gentle breeze 
which kept everything fresh.  The breeze, like 
the warmth, was generated by a simple 
cantrip.  Yet now, Elizabeth could feel that 
breeze build into a strong wind that pulled her 
long hair and gown.  She gripped one of the 
marble sconces to steady herself and snapped her 
eyes to centre of the fountain.  She, and everyone else, gasped.
         The World Bell swung like a lodestone 
from its fulcrum, the bottom flaring toward the 
southwest.  It thrummed firmly and 
consistently.  The water in the fountain froze 
into an intricate pattern of ripples and 
troughs.  The artisans who were always nearby 
began madly scribing what they saw.
         But Elizabeth had no eyes for the water, 
nor did any of the mages.  All stares in 
awestruck fear at the bell.  Over the centuries 
since it’s construction it had rung many times, 
but never, not once in all those years, had it swung away from its perch.
         They had expected something to happen, 
but never this.  What in all the stars could it mean?

----------

         “Grastalko!” Bryone shouted as the 
younger Magyar collapsed to the ground.  His 
entire left arm had been wreathed in flame, but 
that subsided as soon as he crumpled into the 
girl’s arms She lowered him to the jagged ground, 
cradling his head in her lap as she knelt.  His 
left arm was blackened up to the shoulder, with 
angry red blotches showing through where the flesh had sundered.
         But the boy did not respond.  His eyes 
were closed and his mouth hung open.  His body 
lay limp in her arms.  Nemgas bent down and 
frowned.  He sheathed Caur-Merripen and then 
wrapped his hand about Grastalko’s throat.  It 
throbbed with life, slow and weak but sure. “He 
wilt live, Bryone.  Fear not.  The pain has grown too much for him.”
         “But his arm!” Bryone cried, one hand 
reaching toward the charred flesh it but shying away.
         “‘Tis nothing thee canst do.” Nemgas 
shifted the stump of his right arm to emphasize 
the point. “He wilt endure with but one arm if he must.”
         Bryone sobbed quietly as she brushed 
Grastalko’s hair from his brow.  His face, though 
lost in exhaustion, still twitched with 
pain.  Nemgas turned his gaze to Dazheen.  The 
seer sat unmoving as she had since they arrived 
at this spot beneath the thundering glare of 
Cenziga.  Before her lay a single card — the 
others were nothing but ash swallowed by the 
wind.  They could see nothing in the card except 
an indistinct darkness.  But the voices and cries 
of the Keepers still rose to tickle their ears.
         “The Marquis’s master,” Dazheen said 
softly, her voice still resigned to death. “He hath arrived.”
         Nemgas turned back to the card and drew 
Caur-Merripen, every muscle in his arm 
taut.  Overhead Cenziga cracked with an angry peal of brilliant blue.

----------

         Everyone held their breath as they 
stared in abject fear at the Åelf who was light 
where he should be dark and dark where he should 
be light.  Eyes limned with unearthly radiance 
regarded them with sullen pleasure.   Compared to 
the Marquis, the gaze of this strange being was 
not malicious.  His consideration appeared beyond 
base emotions.  Those eyes and the turn of the 
lips and posture of the back and arms all spoke 
of a being too high in stature to indulge in 
contempt for creatures so obviously 
inferior.  Instead they each felt a warm regard 
as of a master to a beloved pet who’d just performed an amusing trick.
         It was Abafouq who was the first to 
act.  The Binoq reached into his pouch and flung 
a dart which sailed true through the charged air 
to strike the Åelf Prince in the thigh.  A second 
joined it as Yajakali turned and glanced at the 
darts protruding from his thigh with nothing more 
than curiosity.  But the third and fourth darts 
stopped in midair.  Abafouq gasped and jerked 
upright four feet into the air. Nothing held 
him.  His eyes bulged and his cheeks swelled red, 
before he flew backward into the wall glowing 
with lucnos as if flung by a giant dismissing a 
doll.  Yajakali leisurely removed the darts and tossed them aside.
         Charles spun his Sondeshike and then 
froze in place as every particle of his body 
reverted to unmoving stone.  The Sondeshike 
clattered away from his paws toward the obsidian 
crack in the floor.  Jerome dove forward and 
snatched it back before he, like the Binoq, was 
flung against the far wall.  He fell through the 
illusion and nearly toppled over the edge of 
Metamor’s belfry, but the same force that had 
propelled him drew him back and dropped him on 
the ground, the Sondeckis fighting staff nestled safely beneath him.
         Guernef spread his wings to summon wind 
again but whatever power Yajakali had struck even 
faster.  His wingtips fell to the floor and 
fastened themselves in place.  The Nauh-kaee 
squawked angrily, all four of his legs digging 
and pushing at the ancient stone floor, but his wings could no longer move.
         Kayla had both dragon blades in her paws 
and even managed to jump toward Yajakali’s 
negated corpus before she was flung against the 
wall, the tips of both blades biting into the 
veins of lucnos and firmly imbedding 
themselves.  The metal tang vibrated as the 
dragons struggled to free themselves.  Kayla’s 
head banged back into the fluff of her tail but 
she still felt the sharp smack of the wall against her skull.
         James reached for his sword but stopped 
and fell back two paces, the whites of his eyes 
showing and his long ears folded back in equine 
fright.  Lindsey stared with disconsolate anguish 
but likewise seemed incapable of doing 
anything.  Andares kept his ivory handled blade 
before him, but he made no move to advance on the 
artifacts and their master towering above.
         Yajakali lowered his black eyes and 
stared with beneficent regard at the three 
figures bound upon the Dais.  He stretched out 
one leg and descended from atop the Sword until 
he stood beside the corpulent steward 
Vigoreaux.  His bright lips parted to reveal 
black teeth. “Thank you.” His voice was like the 
sweet song of flutes blended with the harmonious 
warmth of horns.  His angular eyes did not leave 
Vigoreaux’s terrified face. “With you we will unlatch.”
         He turned and walked through the black 
barrier separating the Dais’s three captives.  He 
stood over the grizzled castellan Sir Autrefois 
and favoured him with the same smile. “Thank 
you.  With you we shall loop.”  They could see 
his flesh and muscles strain, but he could move 
no more than could any who’d tried to strike the Prince.
         Yajakali stepped through the next 
barrier and folded his hands over his waist.  His 
smile did not falter. “Thank you.  With you we 
shall loose.  All will be set right again.”
         James took advantage of Yajakali’s 
distraction to try and shake Charles loose from 
his prison of stone.  The burned vine was still 
cradled around his neck and twisted to brush 
across the donkey’s hoof, but neither of them 
could make the rat move. “Come on, Charles,” 
James whispered into his saucer-shaped ear. “Come on!”
         The donkey felt his heart nearly stop 
when he looked toward the three artifacts glowing 
their vile hue.  Yajakali stepped through the 
black nimbus intersecting the nine stanchions at 
the Dais’s corners and looked at him.  His gaze 
did not rest on the donkey for long, but swept 
over them with that same austere majesty.  “Thank 
you all.  Your places in my world are assured.  I 
do not forget those who aid me.”
         Lindsey snapped, hopping a step forward, 
spittle flinging from her muzzle. “Aid you?  Aid 
you!  You killed Zhypar!  Damn you!  Damn you to Hell!”
         Yajakali turned toward the red-furred 
kangaroo and walked forward with arms 
outstretched.  Not as a man coming to comfort a 
woman, but as a master come to inspect the wound 
on a faithful hunting dog. “Do not be 
afraid.  Together we will undo what has gone wrong.”
         But the northerner reached for her 
axe.  Yajakali did not flinch when she swung, but 
let the weapon burrow itself into his side.  He 
smiled, teeth black behind bright lips.  Lindsey 
drew back her axe and swung again.  Yajakali 
stood and received the blow, and 
another.  Lindsey’s eyes blurred with hatred, and 
still she drove that axe home into his side and 
chest.  Yet the Prince of Jagoduun suffered no 
harm.  His smile remained serene and infinitely patient.
         If Lindsey was aware that her efforts 
were in vain, she gave no sign.  James watched 
for several seconds before his ears lifted 
curiously.  He took a step backward, careful his 
hooves didn’t clop.  But Yajakali did not turn, 
his strange eyes watching the red-furred kangaroo 
drive the axe into his flesh time after 
time.  James took several more steps back until 
he was completely out of the Prince’s field of 
vision, lifted his sword gingerly, and moved 
around to the other side of the Dais.
         Through the black film the flowed back 
and forth between the stanchions, the donkey 
could make out Jessica lying with her wings 
pinned beneath her.  Her talons stuck out, the 
black claws tensing in the air.  James glanced at 
Yajakali who remained as placid as ever.  Sucking 
in his breath, the donkey lifted his sword and stabbed through the black film.
         The blade sizzled red hot as it passed 
through, the metal tip melting into brilliant 
slag.  James cried and jumped back, and while 
still in the air, was caught by an invisible hand 
and flung into the wall behind him.  He seemed to 
strike one of the Pillars of Ahdyojiak before falling forward in a heap.
         Lindsey paused a moment in her swinging 
to cry, “James!” The hand clutched her and drove 
her to the ground, the axe clattering and fixing 
itself in place before her.  Her thick tail, long 
feet, and even her arms, all planted themselves 
on the stone and stayed there.  She gasped for 
breath, the tears of rage still steaming her cheek fur.
         Yajakali calmly walked to the only left 
who had not been frozen by his power.  The Åelf 
Andares-es-sebashou trembled as he approached, 
and his grip on the ivory-handled blade 
weakened.  The tip wavered wildly but Andares was 
able to keep it aloft.  Yajakali stepped into the 
blade, pinning it in his odd black flesh.  He 
didn’t even sound irritated when he spoke. “You 
belong to the Lord of Colours.  I have allowed 
this one to strike me because her sorrow is great 
and to show that nothing you do can balk me.”
         Andares narrowed his eyes and took 
several deep breaths.  His golden eyes met 
Yajakali’s impassive gaze, and te fear in them 
slowly kindled into fire.  He gingerly pushed on 
the sword, the point sinking further into 
Yajakali’s flesh.  The silver tip emerged from 
his left shoulder blade without a drop of blood on it.
         “Tell your beasts to cease fighting 
this,” Yajakali said in his sing-song voice.
         Andares shook his head. “No.”  He pulled 
the blade down, and it moved slowly through Yajakali’s chest toward his spine.
         “I am your Prince, Andares-es-sebashou.” 
The air of majesty and authority around him 
swelled.  Those flung against the walls felt a 
compulsion to prostrate their unworthy 
bodies.  Even Charles, locked in unmoving stone, 
knew deep down that it was a travesty that he 
could not abase himself before this blessed 
incarnation that turned all light upon itself. “I 
can hold them indefinitely.  I will subsume their 
will if I must.  Aid me as you are, and your star shall never fade.”
         The younger Åelf’s knees buckled as if 
he were ready to fall to them.  His eyes closed 
and he shook from head to toe.  His chest heaved 
with a sob forcing its way up his throat.  His 
head lowered to stifle that sob.  The sword 
sliced back and forth through Yajakali’s 
permeable flesh and did him no harm.  Yajakali’s 
skin seemed to shine with an unearthly radiance, 
all the colour around him being drawn into nothing.
         The sob turned into defiant roar and 
Andares tossed his head back like a fierce 
stallion throwing off an ostler.  He yanked the 
sword clean through Yajakali’s side, and then 
swung it through the Prince’s neck.  The head did 
not stir.  Still Andares scowled and with bitten 
words, snarled, “Never!  You are not my 
Prince!  You are dead.  A dead Åelf clinging to a 
life that is gone.  You cannot have it back.”
         Yajakali’s eminence flared even 
brighter.  He nodded his head once and the 
invisible hand yanked Andares back into one of 
the columns.  A bit of blood smeared his black 
hair as his head smacked into the basalt and 
lucnos.  Andares stumbled forward, taut face 
clenched in pain.  His blade clattered to the floor.
         The Åelf Prince betrayed no regret at 
being rejected by the only one of his race among 
them.  He turned toward his three artifacts and 
slid his fingers through the black film.  It 
eddied and climbed his arms like salmon 
spawning.  A look of purest ecstasy limned his 
colourless, angular features.  Though his skin 
was already black like jade, the darkness seemed 
to suck away even the little light that did lay 
there where shadows should have been.  With the 
long sigh of a philosopher contemplating an 
esoteric question, Yajakali turned from the 
triumphant artifacts and regarded them one by one.
         He walked toward James first, bent low 
and with the tip of one finger, drew the donkey 
to his hooves.  James stood, dark eyes meeting 
the Åelf almost empty of intelligence.  They had 
never seen the whites so large in the donkey’s 
eyes.  Yajakali drew a finger down to the charm 
hanging around his neck and tapped it once.  A 
bit of the darkness left his arm and circled 
around the charm and the string from which it 
hung.  The black smoke curled around the string 
like a snake about a tree, circling round and 
round the yew-shaped charm.  And then both vanished.
         “You no longer need those,” Yajakali 
said with supreme resplendence.  James’s eyes 
shut and his hands gripped either side of his 
head as if he suffered a pounding headache.  As 
Yajakali watched, the donkey jerked this way and 
that, before he crumpled to his knees breathing 
heavily.  The lines of strain left his features 
as a tangible peace spread over him.  His eyes 
opened, no longer subsumed by fear but with 
uniformity of purpose.  He looked up at Yajakali, 
and then with obeisance did him homage as a supplicant to their god.
         Yajakali walked to where Abafouq lay 
sprawled in front of the stone wall.  The Binoq’s 
body trembled as the monochrome Åelf let a 
tendril of darkness rise form his arms and 
coruscate across his charm.  Moment slater, he 
too was wrapped in utter adoration of the Prince.
         Charles wanted so very badly to avert 
his eyes from the spectacle of seeing his friends 
turned into slaves by the corrupting power of 
Marzac.  What had Zagrosek said of it?  He tried 
to fight, wanted so very much to fight, but there 
was nothing there to fight.  What Marzac wanted 
he would do.  It was only in the little things, 
those little moments, and those brief times when 
he was let loose, that he could act as he wished 
to, but even then, he knew he was a dog on a leash.
         And from the way James, Abafouq, and now 
Kayla, Jerome and Guernef, abased themselves 
before the Åelf, he could not help but wonder if 
the force of Marzac hadn’t been te will of 
Yajakali all along.  His demeanour may be that of 
a benevolent emperor from a house of unassailable 
lineage, but he’d forced his servants to do the 
vilest of things.  They were nothing but beasts 
to him.  Andares was granted a modicum of respect 
solely because they were the same race.  And even 
that sliver was not enough to keep Yajakali from 
destroying his charm against Marzac.  A moment 
later and the pearl-grey skinned Åelf was on his 
knees before Yajakali, face rapt in ecstatic devotion.
         Yajakali passed behind Charles and the 
sobbing of Lindsey came to an end a second 
later.  The rat trembled inside his stone skin, 
offering what prayers he could to Eli for 
strength.  He beseeched Blessed Yahshua, pleaded 
with Holy Mother Yanlin, and begged every one of 
the Saints amongst the Sondeckis for 
protection.  Yet in this darkest and foulest 
place on earth, he felt nothing in reply. If they 
were here for him, he could not feel them.
         And then the Åelf Prince stood before 
him.  The darkness along his arms was mostly 
spent, but a thin tendril still curled around his 
wrist. Before that tendril even leapt to disable 
his charm, Charles felt the stone give way to 
flesh.  Even in the nearly two months since he’d 
been freed from stone at Agathe’s death, he still 
hadn’t grown accustomed to the sensation of stone 
softening into flesh.  Every fibre of his being 
relaxed with one great sigh.  The vine on his 
shoulders curled a little closer, it’s sinews 
blackened from Zagrosek’s fire, but it seemed to 
understand the rat needed protection.
         Yajakali lowered his strange backward 
eyes to stare at the vine.  A strangely pleased 
smile creased his bright lips. “You have no need 
to fear.  I bring no harm to your root.” The 
black tendril uncurled from the Åelf’s arm and 
coursed toward the rat.  Charles tried to stumble 
backward, holding out his paws to ward it 
away.  Like a viper it darted through the air and 
latched onto his paw.  He shook his arm and 
squeaked his fright as it slithered up his arm 
and down his chest to the yew charm.
         The vine feebly moved to intercept it, 
but the darkness was swifter than 
thought.  Charles gasped and put his paws on his 
chest and found the talisman protecting him 
gone.  For a split second fear overwhelmed him, 
and he leapt backward several more paces.  A 
terrible presence, carrying with it whispers of 
dark deeds and promises of fulfilling every 
desire that should pass through his heart, 
pressed into his mind.  He fell to his knees and 
grabbed the fur on either side of his head, ears 
folded back, tail lashing behind him.
         Something, like a knife, slid through 
the cracks in his thoughts and settled into 
him.  The invasion made all his muscles twitch 
and spasm.  His Sondeck fought against it, but 
could find nothing against which tog ain 
purchase.  The presence settled into his power 
too, corralling it with a twitch of 
whim.  Charles tried to think, but found he 
couldn’t think at all.  This other would do that and everything else for him.
         His eyes popped open and before him 
standing in resplendent majesty was his god.  The 
beast that he was, so low and undeserving, fell 
to his knees and then lowered his muzzle to the 
ground.  His body quivered with the joy of 
showing his god the homage due him.  His ears 
turned upward to hear the command of his master, 
that he might cooperate in the doing of his 
will.  Charles felt a surge of elation at the 
very prospect that such a command might come.
         “Rise each of you,” Yajakali’s voice 
beckoned.  They stood and stared with love at the 
Åelf who bore shadow where he should have light, 
and light where he should hae shadow.  He turned 
and faced them one by one. “Only eight of 
you?  Perfect.  Together, we will be nine.  As 
they who fought were nine.  And they who died are 
nine.  I have chosen your sigils for the spell.  Now I shall draw them.”
         He stepped first to the younger 
Åelf.  Andares’s golden eyes were rapt with love 
for his Prince.  Yajakali drew a quick squiggle 
across his chest with one finger, and then two 
downward slashes through it.  The three lines 
together flared a deep red like burnished brass 
reflecting the chasm’s fire.  Andares nodded and 
walked toward the pillar with the same 
chevron.  He put his back to the pillar and stood 
waiting for all to be complete.
         Next he came to Lindsey, and his fingers 
danced in so complicated a pattern that the 
chevron appeared to pass through her chest in its 
quest to swallow itself.  The sigil glowed like 
the one upon Andares, burning into their eyes 
with sweet promise.  Lindsey hopped toward the 
pillar to the left of Andares and stood in front 
of it facing the blessed artifacts.  Charles’s 
whiskers twitched with eagerness.  He hoped he would be next.
         But their god went to James 
instead.  The donkey lifted his long snout higher 
as Yajakali’s finger inscribed a rune fashioned 
from six lines like a crosshatch in three 
directions.  The donkey clopped humbly to the 
pillar at Andares’s right.  And then Yajakali 
stepped before the skunk.  Kayla’s tail thrashed 
behind her and the deep crimson symbol fashioned 
with a complex weave of curves and slashes glowed 
with august fire.  She took position before the pillar at Lindsey’s left.
         And then finally, the rat felt his heart 
exude triumph as his god on this earth stepped 
before him and inscribed a swirl over his chest 
with many lines connected the edges, and a zigzag 
through the middle like a star bent in on 
itself.  He could feel every line and curve like 
a brilliant warmth that nevertheless left his 
body cold.  It felt as if the chevron glowed not 
with its own lie, but reflected the life of he 
upon whom it had been drawn.  Charles could see 
the bronze aura shining on his arms and was 
delighted that he had so much life to give to his god.
         And then his legs lifted, an 
understanding dawning in his mind.  He bore the 
third chevron, and it was his place to stand 
before the pillar bearing the same mark.  He 
walked to it, noted the way the lucnos glowing 
its bright blue complemented his sombre red, and 
turned his back to the pillar.  Before him rose 
one of the stanchions on the Dais.  He lifted his 
eyes past it and stared in wonder at the Censer 
brimming with darkness in gaseous form, and the 
brilliant golden blade rising like a indomitable spire out of a black lake.
         With his wider field of vision, he could 
watch the light of the artifacts and 
Yajakali.  Their beautiful god continued to mark 
them.  Next he came to Jerome, and upon his 
fellow Sondecki he drew the seventh chevron, 
which seemed to be two spider webs 
intersecting.  Jerome crossed to the opposite 
side of the artifacts and found his place at 
Kayla’s left.  Abafouq received the fourth 
chevron, a mixture of a four pointed star with 
lines curving around it like a whirlpool.  He 
found his place at Charles’s right.  Guernef, the 
last of them, was given the sixth chevron upon 
the front of his chest, a thing of mazes and 
cul-de-sacs that nevertheless appeared easier to 
follow than any of the higher-order 
chevrons.  The massive Nauh-kaee stood on his 
hind legs to keep the chevron visible and he 
hunched to the pillar at Jerome’s left.
         Yajakali was the only one left, and he 
took the fifth pillar between Abafouq and 
Guernef. He spread his arms wide and the last of 
the chevrons emerged through his mismatched 
flesh.   It almost seemed to the rat to be a 
series of five five-sided stars with each point 
touching another, being sucked inward to a 
central point.  It was so beautiful he couldn’t help but breathe faster.
         “The nine who will be are!” Yajakali 
intoned with the flutes in his voice sounding 
like brass trumpets. “I bring forth the nine who 
are dead.”  And then he began to sing.  The words 
were unknown to the rat, steeped in the archaic 
and glorious words of the Åelf.  The melody 
wended to both melancholy and majesty.  One by 
one, and in reverse order to the way he’d drawn 
their sigils, they each took up that melody.  But 
they did not merely join their living deity; they 
started the song over, setting up a contrapuntal 
dialogue that created both moments of clattering 
dissonance and delicate consonance.
         Charles lifted his snout high as the 
words trilled from his tongue into the air.  His 
eyes gazed upward to the vault of the heavens 
over Ahdyojiak that he could glimpse through the 
ceilings of the Metamor belfry, the cavern 
beneath Yesulam, and the Hall of Unearthly 
Light.  The stars continued their slow dance 
through the black moonless sky, hopping back and 
forth as if they couldn’t quite decide where they 
should be.  What power his god had if he could control the stars!
         Yajakali’s voice dwindled to a quiet 
whisper.  A dark shadowy wisp curled over the 
Censer’s rim and danced over the air.  It circled 
the stanchion closest to the Åelf Prince, and 
then spiralled down its length.  From the cleft 
just beneath the Dais a dark vapour lifted like a 
gossamer veil caught in the wind.  The two 
emanations flowed together and settled on the 
ground a few feet in front of Yajakali.
         The darkness spun and swelled, the wisp 
drawing the mist upward into a large shape.  Two 
arms, two legs, a head, with wide girth and 
distinctly human visage.  The wisp spun around 
the figure faster and faster until it finally 
changed from a deep black into a blinding red 
streak that drew colour from the silhouette.
         Standing with arms hanging at his sides 
and fat cheeks sagging in a lifeless scowl was a 
man they had long thought dead.  Piggish eyes 
gazed at the three artifacts, but did not look 
back at the Keepers who had all heard of his 
traitorous acts.  He was still dressed in his 
garish doublet and hose marred by a gewgaw of 
colours that clashed almost painfully.  Upon his 
chest glowed the same brilliant symbol as Yajakali bore.
         It was Lord Altera Loriod come back from 
the dead.  Their god must know what he was doing 
to bring such a loathsome example of humanity back.
         As soon as Loriod appeared, Abafouq’s 
voiced descended like Yajakali’s, and from the 
censer and the cleft came the wisp of darkness 
and a new crimson hued veil.  They came together, 
dancing to the seven-toned melody, and blended 
into a much smaller shape, one about the same 
size as the diminutive Binoq.  Once Abafouq’s 
voice completely died, another whom they knew to 
be dead appeared before him.  The hawk on the 
altar struggled for a moment as her  master 
Wessex took shape with the fourth chevron glowing 
on his chest.  Unmoving eyes remained fixed on 
the artifacts as Guernef, balanced precariously 
on his hind paws, brought his song to a conclusion too.
         Before the Nauh-kaee materialized 
another form with material from the Censer and 
from the otherworldly cleft.  This shape had two 
arms but its legs were concealed within a wide 
robe.  A long tail curled up behind its back 
through a part in the robe.  The robe, when 
colour came to it, was a bright purple with 
lightning bolts inscribed along the collar and 
sleeves.  A grey-furred face with large golden 
eyes emerged from the robe, while the black and 
white striped tail danced behind his tufted ears.
         Charles nodded in understanding.  All 
whose deaths had been bought by his god’s 
artifacts were now being brought forth.  Their 
lives belong to the Sword, Censer, and 
Dais.  They were, as much as he was, beholden to 
Yajakali.  For even as Ambassador Yonson took his 
place before the Nauh-kaee, the rat’s voice 
reached the conclusion of the song and the mist and veil floated toward him.
         The figure mostly blocking his view of 
the blessed artifacts was that of a Bishop of the 
Ecclesia.  Charles didn’t recognize him, but what 
he could see of him was a cherubic face, portly 
middle, and the dark hair and white face typical 
of men from the forests surrounding the 
Sonngefilde city of Eavey.  Could this be the 
Bishop of Eavey?  How had he died in furthering Yajakali’s plans?
         The questions seemed inconsequential to 
the rat.  As long as it furthered his god’s 
goals, he would exult in it.  He stared past the 
Bishop toward Jerome before whom another figure 
came to life.  Dressed in a purple cloak with 
cowl drawn over her face, was the Runecaster 
Agathe.  Her right eye still burned with that 
sombre flame, and it’s luminescence was matched 
by the seventh chevron smelting on her 
chest.  Her good eye, though still bloodshot, 
bore none of the malice he was accustomed to seeing in it.
         Yajakali spread out his arms, black face 
exultant, the white shadow under his chin 
spreading wider.  His fingers parted as they rose 
inch by inch into the air.  Bitterly cold wind 
whipped from Metamor blended with the humid 
warmth of Ahdyojiak and the stifling dustiness 
beneath Yesulam and Marzac.  And with it, their 
arms also spread outward, rising with his.
         Before James coalesced the figure of 
Zagrosek, dead only hours.  His body, once shorn 
in two, was whole again.  His eyes never left the 
artifacts.  And then in front of Kayla the 
Marquis materialized from the darkness of the 
cleft and Censer.  His face, once arrogant, and 
his eyes, once delighting in their torment, were 
now empty just like the others.  All of them, 
Charles knew, were vessels waiting to be filled.
         As the rat’s arms stretched out fully to 
his sides, he saw the ancient one, Qan-af-årael 
take shape in front of the much younger Åelf who 
had been his student for centuries.  A part of 
him wished it could ache at seeing a face once 
filled with such austere kindness now filled with 
nothing.  But that was not Yajakali’s will for 
him, and so he turned to where Lindsey stood, 
waiting to see the last of the dead return.
         The last of the mist seeped from the 
Censer’s rim and coiled down the stanchion like a 
snake.  The aetherial veil rising out of the 
cleft settled on the ground a few feet before the 
red-furred kangaroo’s toes and spread out in a 
very similar shape, circled endlessly by that 
wisp of black smoke.  A moment later, the 
dust-coloured kangaroo known as Zhypar Habakkuk 
stood before them all once more.
         Yajakali’s hands reached far above his 
head and so too did theirs.  Even Guernef with 
his quadruped body managed the feat.  The song 
ended, but his voice echoed so strongly that the 
bells in the Metamor belfry began rocking back 
and forth. “The nine who are dead have been 
raised!  Now bring forth the nine who fought!”
         As one, the nine who died stepped toward 
the artifacts.  Even though Wessex’s legs were 
shorter than all the rest, they still managed to 
walk in unison and reach the artifacts at the 
same moment.  The bells swung inward, the ringers 
tugging magnetically toward the Sword.  The 
golden blade swelled and radiated images of its 
malevolent self into the air.  The nine climbed 
onto the stone platform above the cleft and 
rested their palms on the gems surmounting the 
golden stanchions at the Dais’s corners.
         Charles’s eyes widened as each of the 
nine who’d died began glowing.  A faint red 
nimbus swelled from their flesh, like forge-blown 
glass cooling under the blower’s careful 
touch.  The energy passed out of their bodies and 
into the gems like water drawn up a stalk.  They 
stepped back and down from the platform, eyes and 
arms wide, with Habakkuk and Yonson keeping their 
ears folded back and tails low.
         The light sank into the gems, cascading 
from facet to facet.  A veritable hum filled the 
air and every mote of dust vibrated until they 
shone like a desert haze.  A single beam of light 
burst from each of the gems and struck the 
Sword’s tip in a blinding sunburst of pure 
energy.  Charles and the other animal-morphed 
squinted to watch.  Yajakali’s face grew even darker.
         The Sword thrummed with a thunderous 
ostinato.  It’s voice reverberated in their minds 
and was echoed by the Prince’s lips. “The 
Sunderer of Worlds break forth the 
seals!  Complete the nine that we might sunder this world!”
         Another tattoo of clamorous drums and 
the Sword’s light shot back through the nine gems 
and all of their eyes stung as if jabbed with a 
pin.  Charles and the rest blinked several times 
before they could see that their company had been 
increased by yet another nine.  The newcomers had 
dark-toned skin like many Southlanders, each 
dressed in extravagant robes that curled from the 
left to the right with a sash tied about the 
middle and around the back.  The ends of the 
sashes lifted over the shoulders and ended at the 
collarbone.  Jewels of many colours — citrine, 
chalcedony, agate, onyx, jasper, aventurine, 
amethyst, carnelion, and tiger’s eye — dangled 
from the sashes and the edges of the robes, while 
tassels flashed with gold and black thread from 
their sleeves.  Slippers sparkled with jade 
stones covering their top.  The toes turned up in 
a decorative point like a jongleur and on their 
heads they bore turbans wrapped about diadems 
whose hue matched the gemstones for each of the Dais’s nine stanchions.
         Each of the nine standing closest to the 
artifacts had a large beard coming down to the 
middle of their chest.  They bore on the back of 
their robes the chevron, though these were 
fashioned from thread and not magical 
quickening.  On their chests the red sigils 
burned with an even brighter hue than they did on 
Charles and the others.  They clasped their hands 
in a circle and their voices sang with a language none now living knew.
         “What was, what is, and what shall be 
have met,” Yajakali crowed from where he 
stood.  Thin lines began circling through the air 
between them, wisps of blue and green that teased 
his sight, like strands of hair caught in a wind 
he could not feel.  The strands flowed clockwise 
between each circle of nine, and they flitted 
past all the faster the closer they neared the 
cleft.  Charles marvelled as he realized that 
what he witnessed was magic itself, bound so 
tightly and so profusely that it was now visible 
to his untrained eyes.  What must Kayla and the others see?
         Their god at the very least did not 
appear alarmed, but his face continued to darken 
with the increasing light surrounding the Dais, 
Censer and Sword.  His head tilted back and his 
words began to murmur across all their 
tongues.  “Now, unlatch us from tis 
moment.  Sunderer of Worlds!  Take the first that has been prepared for thee!”
         The Sword, gleaming with gold and also 
shining with an inner luminescence that matched 
the blue nimbus from the lucnos fashioned into 
the Hall of Unearthly Light, swelled in size, the 
tip growing wider than the rest.  After a moment 
of fascination, Charles realized that the sword 
was not growing, but distorting.  The tip bent 
downward, flexing of its own accord like no blade 
had ever flexed, until it pointe directly over 
the body of the Marquis’s Steward, the hapless 
Vigoreaux.  His eyes, already filled with terror, 
whitened further, as his the artifacts limned his 
body bronze.  The tip of the blade twisted as it 
bent down, quivering with a need long denied.
         Charles held his breath as he gazed past 
the Bishop and the ancient mage standing between 
him and the artifacts.  Everyone peered closer; 
even the Pillars of Ahdyojiak stretching 
endlessly into the sky bent toward the 
artifacts.  The flashes of magical force sparkled 
brighter and sped faster toward the cleft beneath the Dais.
         And then the sword struck like a viper, 
plunging straight into Vigoreaux’s head.  The 
Steward twitched once and then his body fell 
still in death.  But only for a moment.  Every 
mote of his flesh began to quiver, oscillating 
back and forth, up and down, wider and wider 
until the whole of his form was a haze of light 
and colour.  Through it all the sword remained 
bent into that mass, absorbing those particles 
with deliberate calm.  When there was nothing 
left, the sword straightened, aglow even more brilliantly than before.
         That glow settled into the Censer’s 
basin, until what had once been dark was now a 
vibrant yellow flame.  The flame coruscated down 
the sides of the Censer, along the base of the 
Dais, and up through each of the stanchions.  Ray 
of energy shot out, striking the circle of nine 
mages where the chevrons were inscribed in their 
chest.  The light passed through them and struck 
the nine who died in the same place.  And then, 
it came even through them and reached Charles and 
the rest in the outermost circle of this 
epoch-spanning Symphony.  Their arms still 
outstretched, the energy radiated out with an 
explosion that made every chamber they stood in shudder.
         Beyond the Pillars and the Belfry, the 
stars, once wobbly and indistinct, spun across 
the celestial vault until the sky was nothing 
more than a stream of white concentric circles 
that moved north and south through the 
heavens.  The rat’s eyes marvelled at this for 
several seconds before noting that the Bishop’s 
greying hair seemed white one moment, then grey, 
and then black, before returning to grey.  He 
glanced to his right and watched as Abafouq’s 
face lined and his hair whitened, before resuming 
its dark complexion again. To his left he watched 
James’s muzzle grey and his cheeks sag, before 
returning to his usual vivacity.  All of the 
others seemed to wobble in their ages, even 
Wessex who one moment looked a child and the next a young man.
         Yajakali spoke, and their tongues moved 
with his words. “Unhitched now, Sunderer of 
Worlds, the second shall be to loop what has become unmoored.”
         The Sword bent again, this time toward 
the burly Castellan, Sir Autrefois.  All of them 
held their breath this time as the tip of that 
golden blade neared the quivering heap of 
frightened man-flesh.  Yajakali’s eyes beamed 
shadow as he watched.  Autrefois opened his mouth 
to scream but was cut short as the Sword pierced 
his skull.  His flesh, like that of Vigoreaux 
before him, began to dissolve into a bluish haze 
through which they could see the golden blade and 
the cavorting demons inscribed on the Dais’s broad surface.
         Those particles of Autrefois were 
swallowed by the Sword and channelled once more 
into the Censer.  The basin, once filled with 
golden light, now sparkled with pinpricks of 
azure dust.  They crawled over the rim, across 
the rapes and murders carved into the Censer’s 
bowl and column, and then over to the stanchions 
to power the mystic gems.  Charles tensed with 
excitement as the light, no less brilliant and 
piercing for being blue, passed through the nine 
mages, the nine dead, and then into him and his friends.
         With another deafening concussion, the 
rooms smacked as if settling into a new 
place.  The stars, spinning so fast, ground to a 
sudden halt and found their place in the 
sky.  The world they watched o’er was no longer 
the world that Charles knew.  The white-peaked 
mountains still lay beyond Metamor’s belfry, but 
there was no more sign of the city, only of an 
endless expanse of forest cloaking a forgotten 
castle.  The cavern beneath Yesulam now let in 
starlight through several doorways once choked 
with rubble.  The fulgurites stretching beneath 
them gleamed like polished tiger’s eye.  Even 
Ahdyojiak was a land transformed.  The jungle 
receded behind a city of ivory and marble that glowed silver in the starlight.
         Only the Hall of Unearthly Light seemed 
the same as it had been before.  But to their 
eyes, the greatest of changes came not to the 
world beyond, but to their god so close at 
hand.  Yajakali, his flesh once twisted so that 
light seemed shadow and shadow light, blossomed 
with renewed colour.  His cheeks were flush with 
a silvery-grey sheen, his ears tipped with white, 
and his eyes a blue with golden highlights.  His 
garments were purest white, a white no ivory, no 
matter how clean, could boast.  Shadows settled 
where they should.  And the fifth chevron 
decorating his chest appeared to dance with glee in the confines of its shape.
         The strands of magic that had become 
visible to the rat now deepened and 
lengthened.  No longer were they wisps of hair 
caught on an unfelt wind, but they were the 
torrents of a river being swallowed by 
whirlpool.  Eddies and whorls drove past as they 
fell into the funnel down into the cleft so empty 
but for its crimson stain.  The hem of his tunic 
and the tip of his tail felt the tug of that 
whirlpool and began pulling to his left.  The rat 
cared not.  He was with his god who was only 
moments away from setting the world aright.
         “Looped we have become,” Yajakali cried, 
his voice rising an octave to gleam with all the 
bombast of trumpeters. “Now, Sunderer of Worlds, 
loose the mistake and take it with you into eternal darkness where it belongs!”
         Charles’s heart beat anxiously.  This 
was what his god had worked toward over 
millennia.  How privileged a beast must he be to 
aid him in this!  His eyes gleamed as the golden 
blade bent toward the last of the three bound on 
the Dais.  The black hawk, Jessica, twitched to 
get out of the way of the blade, but could not 
move from where she was pinned on her back.  Her 
chest rose with each gasped breath, and nestled 
in those dark feathers, something reflected the golden light of the Sword.
         The golden blade bent and lowered 
itself, the tip wavering as if smelling Jessica’s 
flesh and deciding which was the most succulent 
part.  Golden eyes watched the blade, tongue 
struggling to move to find the words to some 
incantation that could save her.  But there was 
nothing that could be done.  Yajakali’s will 
could not be resisted.  The artifacts he’d forged 
brought a link between this world and the 
Underworld, and that brought it a power no force 
from this world could ever balk.  The Sword 
tensed and the hawk’s eyes widened.  Charles 
ground his incisors together and held his breath 
one last time.  He would never need to again.
         The Sword plunged.  Yajakali’s face 
shone brighter than the sun.  All of them watched 
with eager eyes for the final death.  The 
whirlpool of energy sucked and swallowed 
everything down into the ravenous cleft.
         And then the Sword, just shy of 
Jessica’s head, stopped.  From her chest emanated 
a crystal blue light that arrested the blade. It 
quivered with fury, but could approach no 
closer.  Charles blinked, his breath passing out 
of his chest, and felt something drawing slowly 
out of his mind.  The Sword stabbed and stabbed 
but Jessica remained untouched.  Yajakali’s face blossomed in fury.
         “What is this that dares to thwart me!” 
Yajakali bellowed with a rage that turned their 
bones to dust. “No power can stand between me and my will!”
         “This one can,” another voice said.  It 
was so familiar, yet through the haze of 
Yajakali’s will — how had Charles ever thought of 
that Åelf as his god? — it took him until the 
speaker said more that he knew it to be the now 
dead kangaroo, Zhypar Habakkuk. “Like all that 
thwarts you, it did so in a small way.  An enemy 
you once thought slain has reached out his hand 
and saved Jessica and all that is from you.”
         Yajakali did not break the circle of 
nine, but his gaze, imperious and maniacal, swept 
down on the kangaroo.  Habakkuk trembled under 
its power, but did not buckle. “What enemy is 
this?  I left my enemies no place on earth from which to strike!”
         “From no place on earth,” Qan-af-årael 
said. “From the place between places this one 
strikes.  From the between moments and between 
all places he has waited ever since slaying the dragon you took.”
         Yajakali looked from the Åelf back to 
Jessica who could no more move now than she could 
before.  The Sword continued to stab but made no 
progress. “Pelain of Cheskych?  The wolf 
knight?  He slayed a dragon and died in 
Carethedor, defiling one of our cities.  He cannot reach us here.”
         Zagrosek smiled with a half-sarcastic 
twitch to his lips that the rat had long 
known.  It occurred to Charles that neither he 
nor his friends still living were able to move; 
their minds may have been freed from Yajakali, 
but not their bodies.  The nine Southlands mages 
of antiquity also remained immobile.  Why were the nine who died free to speak?
         The question percolated at the back of 
his mind as his fellow Sondecki scoffed, 
“Carethedor is entwined with Ahdyojiak.  The 
Pillars are theirs, and Pelain died in the midst 
of their counterparts in Carethedor.  Of course 
he is in the Imbervand.  And you brought him here with the Pillars themselves.”
         But Yajakali would have none of it. “If 
Pelain or any others were here I would know of 
it.” Spectral arms emanated from the Åelf 
Prince’s chest and reached across the two inner 
circles.  The flow of magic tugged them 
relentlessly to the left and down toward the 
cleft, but he had strength enough to 
resist.  They reached toward Jessica, unfurling 
to snatch at the talisman that kept the golden Sword at bay.
         “That will not work either,” the Bishop 
declared with piping voice. “The talisman you 
seek was granted by Pelain, but its power comes 
from something far older than he.”
         Yajakali’s eyes burned with a fire that 
made the portly priest flinch. “I am the oldest 
power on this earth!  This will not harm me!” His 
spectral hand stretched over Jessica and passed 
the boundary his Sword could not break.  It 
settled over her chest and grasped what lay there 
nestled safely in her black feathers.
         A howl resounded through the chamber, 
but not a one of them could say what had made 
it.  The raging torrent of magical force ripped 
Yajakali’s spectral arms apart, they sank deep 
into the abyss, and were no more.
         “This force is as old as you, Prince,” 
Wessex intoned in his youthful soprano. “This force is your equal.”
         Yajakali stared at the hawk, and a smile 
crept over his lips. “There is no force that is 
my equal.  It may thwart me for a time, but I 
will undo this binding on the hawk and have her 
life.  Whatever force this is will be thrust into 
nonexistence along with the mistake of time.”
         “Hah!” Loriod sneered in a way that 
still repulsed Charles and the other Metamorians. 
“I thought I had time too.  We all saw how idiotic a mistake that was.”
         Yajakali closed his eyes and the 
whirlpool of magic began to eddy around him, 
creating a secondary vortex.  “We are in the 
loop.  I have all the time I need.  And all the 
magic too.  I will find a way.  My will shall set things aright!”
         Yonson shook his head, even as his robe, 
and the clothes of everyone in the chamber, began 
to tear at the seams and pull toward the Åelf 
Prince. “Your will cannot touch this.  It is the 
one thing you cannot touch.” The lemur’s tail 
danced a jig behind his head and his golden eyes 
brimmed with amusement. “And while you would have 
time against anything anywhere else, you have not 
the time against that which is in the loop with you.”
         Yajakali’s lips curled in vexation.  All 
of their clothes ripped from their bodies and 
flew together around the him in the eddy of 
magic.  The cloth stitched together piece by 
piece into massive arms that blocked out the sky. 
“You can speak, nine who are dead.  But you are 
still dead.  Those who fought me cannot act and 
those who will be are yet to be and can do 
nothing.  There is none in this loop to stop me.”
         With the cowl over her head now joined 
to Yajakali’s newest magical artifice, Agathe’s 
empty eye-socket brought her entire face aglow 
with crimson fire. “We already know Pelain could 
reach through this veil to stop you.  Yet you 
will not accept that truth.  Nor this one: you have already failed, Yajakali.”
         “Failed?” Yajakali laughed as the 
clothes spread over Jessica’s form, undoing 
layers upon layers of protection, scouting 
through her feathers for whatever they might 
find.  And then, with exquisite gentleness, they 
slipped between the talisman and her chest. “I am about to succeed!”
         The Marquis du Tournemire smiled in his 
contemptuous way. “No.  Like Habakkuk said, it is 
the small ways that you have been thwarted.  My 
own was in keeping one card from the flame.  Now 
say hello to my dear friend Dazheen!”
         Yajaklali ignored him, yanking back on 
the assembled cloth.  The talisman ripped free 
and sailed through the air.  Something else, in 
that single moment when the Sword lifted to 
strike unimpeded, burst from a pile of dust in 
one corner of the room to spin through the air 
toward the artifacts.  The Sword thrust at 
Jessica’s exposed face, just as the lowly Queen of Spades passed between them.

----------

         Nemgas and Dazheen heard every word of 
the Åelf Prince as he cast his magnum 
opus.  Cenziga throbbed with frenetic energy, the 
faces dancing in the air coming together to a 
colossal syzygy.  Through the card they saw only 
darkness and could only ponder what they might do.
         And then, Dazheen gasped as she heard 
the aristocrat speak her name. “Nemgas!  Strike!” 
The old woman croaked, her hands shaking with palsy. “Strike now!”
         The Magyar’s grip on Caur-Merripen 
tightened, the silver and black blade quivering 
against his palm.  The darkness in the card 
vanished into a swirl of lights, gold, blue, 
silver, and red.  A vault of starry sky spun 
above a ceiling with four bells and one with 
crisscrossing blue veins and the familiar dome of 
that horrid place beneath Yesulam where he’d fought against Bishop Jothay.
         And then he too screamed as he saw the 
golden blade that Jothay had wielded and that had 
in the end turned on him, driving toward 
him.  Caur-Merripen leapt in his hand, through 
the card, and met that golden blade, driving it 
back.  The world in the card ceased its spin, as 
the card stretched outward in size.  He thrust 
again, driving that blade back from its 
target.  The squeal of hot metal quenched in oil resounded with each blow.
         Overhead, the syzygy completed, and the 
great towering spire of Cenziga bent down from 
the mountain top until it’s life-ending tip 
nearly brushed Nemgas across the shoulders.

----------

         “No!” Yajakali screamed as a black and 
silver blade thrust through the card and 
deflected the Sword.  The room shook with each 
blow, the stars in their places trembling and 
faltering.  The artifacts hissed like a beast in 
agony.  The stanchions twisted and twined, the 
light linking them with the three circles of nine 
broken.  With each blow from the silver and black 
blade, the Sword of Yajakali fell back and up 
until it straightened and stood unmoving atop the 
Censer.  The card followed it, guiding the unseen 
swordsman upward, until the card turned and 
spread inexorably across the ceiling.
         “This Symphony will not be broken!” 
Yajakali declared, but neither he nor the 
artifacts seemed to have a hold on any of them 
anymore.  The creation of clothes tore asunder in 
the magical whirlpool.  The ancient human mages 
drew their hands to their chests and chanted a 
different incantation, their faces dark and sombre with enmity.
         Wessex, Yonson and Agathe rushed through 
them and together helped Jessica off the 
Dais.  The Agathe drew her finger over the 
bindings on her wings, and Wessex did the same to 
her legs.  Jessica gasped and pumped her wings, 
jumping into the air to land nearby.  She bent 
low and snatched the talisman that had fallen to 
the ground.  Apart from the nine in the centre 
chanting furiously, all eyes turned toward 
Yajakali who stared at the two swords trading 
blows with undisguised fury.  This was the anger 
of a vengeful god who’d been defied.
         “Not a one of you will have a place in 
my world now,” Yajakali’s voice boomed from the 
walls.  He stepped into the maelstrom of magic 
and gathered it about himself.  Guernef tried to 
buffet him with his wings, but a flick of his 
wrist and Yajakali sent him sprawling against the 
wall.  He grabbed Loriod by the shoulders and 
flung the fat noble aside.  Charles, Jerome and 
Zagrosek rushed him from three sides.  Yajakali 
swept his left arm out, and the waves of magic 
grabbed their naked flesh and dashed them against the lucnos infested wall.
         And then the room shook and the stars 
overhead began to spin in great circles.  Streams 
of blue dust spewed from the gemstones to 
coalesce into the prone figure of Sir 
Autrefois.  Andares, Lindsey, and Habakkuk rushed 
forward and hoisted him from the Dais.  Lindsey 
then seemed to realize that Habakkuk was beside 
her and wrapped her arms about him, holding to 
his neck, while the younger Åelf undid the 
bindings on the Castellan’s hands and feet.
         “You may undo what I have done for now,” 
Yajakali snarled at the nine mages after flinging 
the lemur aside.  He then smacked Wessex and 
Abafouq together in the magical vortex and then 
spewed them back out again. “But once I have 
destroyed this card I will do it all again.  Your 
resistance will be for naught!”
         The room lurched once more and the stars 
settled into their familiar places.  The last of 
the light drained from the artifacts and the 
Steward Vigoreaux reappeared on the Dais.  James, 
Qan-af-årael, and the foreign Bishop helped him down.
         Yajakali glowered at them all and with a 
flick of his wrist knocked each of them to the 
floor.  Even the nine ancient mages collapsed, 
beards pressed back into their faces.  The 
magical vortex spun faster around them, sucking 
every fibre into its malignant 
whirlpool.  Charles’s tail spun to the left and 
began pulling at his rear.  He grabbed the vine 
in one paw and held it tight as it clutched at 
his neck for whatever purchase it could find.  A 
violent roar accompanied every twist and 
turn.  No longer did the magic appear as a river, 
but as a million cords of light of every hue all 
bundled tightly together and twisting and 
twisting until their shape was drawn so narrow that they threatened to snap.
         Yajakali stepped onto the Dais and 
lifted his defiant white face heavenward.  All 
the magic sucked into the abyss beneath him 
turned around his arms until they glowed so 
bright not a one of them could do aught but look 
at the card to keep from going blind.  Through 
the card they could see a man with only one arm, 
his left, with which he swung and thrust that 
black and silver sword that drove Yajakali’s 
blade into retreat.  Charles thought he 
recognized him, and for a moment considered 
Kashin the Yeshuel, but Kashin had lost his left 
arm, not his right.  Beyond the familiar 
swordsman was a sky turbulent with twilight blue 
vapours and a spire that angled toward them the 
colour of lightning.  It stretched back into what 
could only be described as a mountain that was not a mountain.
         The rage fled from Yajakali’s face and 
his eyes widened in a glimmer of fright.  A laugh 
burst through his lips, and a name bounced from 
his tongue. “Cenziga!” The artifacts trembled and 
fell back at the mention of the name.  Charles 
and the rest covered their ears as a pounding 
rhythm drove through the card and into the 
chamber.  The man with the sword dove out of 
sight as the lightning spire pierced the card.
         Yajakali shook his head. “Never will I 
give up my world!” He through his arms up to send 
all the magic he had at the spire.  And the 
mountain, this strange Cenziga, drove down, the 
spire piercing Yajakali through the chest, and 
then through the Censer and Dais.  With the force 
of a thousand thunderclaps Yajakali’s body and 
the spire broke through the Dais and the platform 
it rested upon to sink into the limitless depths of the crimson abyss below.
         Everything shook with the titanic quake 
as the spire passed through the card, followed by 
the pinnacle of the mountain and every crevice 
and tower.  The world around them flashed with 
every colour of night, stars winking in and out 
of existence.  The Pillars of Ahdyojiak 
straightened and after a brilliant flame of 
white, vanished from sight.  The bells of Metamor 
flew back away from the mountain and the valley 
outside also disappeared.  Even the vault beneath 
Yesulam was dispersed into the reality of the Hall of Unearthly Light.
         One of the ancient wizards grabbed Kayla 
by the arm and shook her. “You have to run!” he 
shouted. “All of you!  Kayla, listen to me!  Run!”
         How they could hear his voice over the 
roar of the mountain they would never 
know.  Kayla shook her head, blinking as she 
stared at the chevron still glowing red in the 
man’s chest.  Her eyes widened in sudden recognition. “Anef the First?”
         His smile was faint.  He nodded. “Our 
mistake is done.  Do not repeat it!  Now run!”
         A single hand reached up from the cleft 
and grasped the edge of the broken 
Dais.  Yajakali’s head emerged through the gap 
even as the mountain continued to push deeper and 
deeper into the abyss.  Blue eyes flamed gold and 
his other arm stretched up against the mountain that had smote his chest.
         Anef the First shook Kayla again and 
waved to them.  His scream was 
desperate.  “Run!  Now!”  The ceiling and walls 
of the Hall of Unearthly Light winked out as the 
lucnos returned to lead.  Cracks speared through 
every pillar and every vault.  Yajakali screamed 
his heart’s last breath of hatred and the ancient chamber began to collapse.

----------


May He bless you and keep you in His grace and love,

Charles Matthias